Comments on: Google’s Technology Statement: Objective “Importance”? http://www.ayman-naaman.net/2009/02/26/googles-technology-statement-importance/ Social Media is Made of People! Sat, 26 Jun 2010 16:51:48 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: naaman http://www.ayman-naaman.net/2009/02/26/googles-technology-statement-importance/comment-page-1/#comment-351 naaman Fri, 27 Feb 2009 22:50:36 +0000 http://www.ayman-naaman.net/?p=235#comment-351 Nice catch, Andy. Indeed, it seems like PageRank is still "objective" everywhere else, e.g., <a href="http://www.google.co.il/corporate/tech.html" rel="nofollow">Israel</a> (Hebrew, you'll have to trust me on that), <a href="http://www.google.fr/corporate/tech.html" rel="nofollow">France</a>, and of course <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.cn%2Fcorporate%2Ftech.html&sl=zh-CN&tl=en&history_state0=" rel="nofollow">China</a> (translated). Phillip, that's interesting -- and I would contend that even the new version of the "explanation" is not correct... "The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google,... do not determine or impact our search results." Of course they do, in some way at least... Nice catch, Andy. Indeed, it seems like PageRank is still “objective” everywhere else, e.g.,
Israel (Hebrew, you’ll have to trust me on that), France, and of course China (translated).

Phillip, that’s interesting — and I would contend that even the new version of the “explanation” is not correct… “The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google,… do not determine or impact our search results.” Of course they do, in some way at least…

]]> By: Philipp Lenssen http://www.ayman-naaman.net/2009/02/26/googles-technology-statement-importance/comment-page-1/#comment-350 Philipp Lenssen Fri, 27 Feb 2009 19:54:11 +0000 http://www.ayman-naaman.net/?p=235#comment-350 Google a while ago changed their terminology in relation to "totally objective" in another place too -- the following is a special page they advertise when you search for [jew], as a site called JewWatch was once ranking best for that query: "Our search results are generated completely objectively and are independent of the beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google. Some people concerned about this issue have created online petitions to encourage us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Because of our objective and automated ranking system, Google cannot be influenced by these petitions. The only sites we omit are those we are legally compelled to remove or those maliciously attempting to manipulate our results." http://web.archive.org/web/20040804010533/http://www.google.com/explanation.html "The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google, as well as the opinions of the general public, do not determine or impact our search results. Individual citizens and public interest groups do periodically urge us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Although Google reserves the right to address such requests individually, Google views the comprehensiveness of our search results as an extremely important priority. Accordingly, we do not remove a page from our search results simply because its content is unpopular or because we receive complaints concerning it. We will, however, remove pages from our results if we believe the page (or its site) violates our Webmaster Guidelines, if we believe we are required to do so by law, or at the request of the webmaster who is responsible for the page." http://www.google.com/explanation.html Google a while ago changed their terminology in relation to “totally objective” in another place too — the following is a special page they advertise when you search for [jew], as a site called JewWatch was once ranking best for that query:

“Our search results are generated completely objectively and are independent of the beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google. Some people concerned about this issue have created online petitions to encourage us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Because of our objective and automated ranking system, Google cannot be influenced by these petitions. The only sites we omit are those we are legally compelled to remove or those maliciously attempting to manipulate our results.”
http://web.archive.org/web/20040804010533/http://www.google.com/explanation.html

“The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google, as well as the opinions of the general public, do not determine or impact our search results. Individual citizens and public interest groups do periodically urge us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Although Google reserves the right to address such requests individually, Google views the comprehensiveness of our search results as an extremely important priority. Accordingly, we do not remove a page from our search results simply because its content is unpopular or because we receive complaints concerning it. We will, however, remove pages from our results if we believe the page (or its site) violates our Webmaster Guidelines, if we believe we are required to do so by law, or at the request of the webmaster who is responsible for the page.”
http://www.google.com/explanation.html

]]> By: Andy Baio http://www.ayman-naaman.net/2009/02/26/googles-technology-statement-importance/comment-page-1/#comment-348 Andy Baio Fri, 27 Feb 2009 18:01:47 +0000 http://www.ayman-naaman.net/?p=235#comment-348 Nice catch. It looks like the change hasn't <a href="http://www.google.co.uk/corporate/tech.html" rel="nofollow">made its way</a> to the UK yet. Maybe Pagerank is still objective there. Nice catch. It looks like the change hasn’t made its way to the UK yet. Maybe Pagerank is still objective there.

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